


The Small Joys of Language

by paraparadigm



Series: Coffee and Rage [3]
Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Dark Comedy, Gen, Humor, Rage demon on Earth, Satire, coffee shop AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:47:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24203851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/paraparadigm/pseuds/paraparadigm
Summary: Displaced by the MCIT who stole its intended prey, a rage demon is transplanted to Earth and is forced to make a living.The continued adventures of Rage, the Reluctant Barista.
Series: Coffee and Rage [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1746937
Comments: 11
Kudos: 27





	The Small Joys of Language

It had been a bad day for Rage, though of course, most of Rage’s days were equally abominable. It had withstood its torment at the Daily Grind, as it did day in and day out, even on Week-Ends. (The locals seemed to find that the box in which Rage Earned Its Living was particularly aptly named, but whatever it was meant to evoke, it was lost on Rage entirely.) 

Rage was often accused by the blobs that toiled alongside it of lacking a “ _certain sense of humor._ ” It considered pointing out that all instances of Humor it had ever met were insufferable prats with a need for validation so bottomless that it would have put the gaping Rift which had sucked Rage into this new, horrible world to shame (Rage had some thoughts on Shame too, but it doubted anyone would want to hear them)—but it was becoming wily, so it refrained.

Humor or not, Rage had been surprised (Rage hadn’t minded Surprise all that much, mostly because you could easily convince it to share sustenance, provided the mortals’ expectations of what the universe owed them were unpleasantly thwarted) that it was uniquely suited for one specific task: making the brown-sludge guzzling meatsacks (these were called _Customers_ , though the only custom Rage could discern was their dependence on the brown sludge, and their firmly held belief that the world owed them Service) feel unwelcome. This, Rage found, was something that its fellow toiling blobs appreciated towards the end of the day, when it was time to perform the Cleaning Ritual. Rage’s role was to glower silently at the meatsacks who stubbornly refused to vacate its Demesne when the large yellow disk hid for the night, and the dome overhead darkened into a muddy brown. Behind the muddy brown, Rage realized, were small little holes—not unlike the ones Rage had spied in the fibrous coverings it put on its feet ( _Socks_ , Rage reminded itself) whenever it held them up to the light. The little holes were called Stars, and as far as Rage was concerned, they were entirely useless, but no one was in a hurry to patch up the dome, which the locals called _Sky_. No one in its new world was in a hurry to patch up anything, really—which, Rage decided, was the Natural Order of Things.

Most of Rage’s days were largely indistinguishable from one another, which is why it did not suspect at all that this particular day would be any different. It directed its ceremonial glower at the remaining Customers — one meatsack carrying a smaller meatsack attached to its front (Rage was reasonably sure that this was one of the wisps of the species, but it couldn’t be entirely sure), one meatsack not so dissimilar from Tony who was flipping through pictures of other meatsacks on its Phone with an expression of slack-jawed boredom, and one meatsack who was, as far as Rage was concerned, loitering for no discernible reason whatsoever and casting Rage strange looks.

Rage scowled. “Anything else I can get you?”

The first two meatsacks retreated quickly, but the third did no such thing, and Rage wondered whether perhaps it was beginning to lose something of itself. The thought filled it with Alarm, which was marginally better than Fear, but not by much.

“Closing up, huh?” the blob said, and shuffled. 

Rage pondered this. Now that it was paying attention, this particular meatsack looked familiar. Rage felt relatively certain that this specific blob was not just a Customer. It was a _Regular_ —which was his fellow toilers’ term for those meatsacks too lazy or too unimaginative to find better sludge elsewhere.

“Time,” Rage confirmed. Time was still an uncomfortable concept for Rage, but it had the felicitous property of being a potential response to pretty much anything, especially when Rage claimed that it didn’t _have_ any — which, of course, it did not, since, as far as it could tell, Time was not something one could own—like Tony owned Computer, and Rage owned Socks with holes in them.

“Umm...” the meatsack honked, and bared its teeth. “I was wondering if I could buy you a drink?”

Rage considered the absurdity of this question. In local parlance, “buying a drink” usually meant that two meatsacks were interested in first mushing their faces together—presumably, Rage conjectured, to determine which sort of sustenance the other one had access to. (This was the only reasonable explanation for this bizarre behavior, and Rage found it oddly comforting in its familiarity, even if the procedure itself filled it with something like Confusion.) However, while Rage had no direct confirmation of this, it suspected that this initial activity was followed by an array of (to Rage, mystifying) steps which would eventually result in more blobby mushing of meatsacks, akin to what it had occasionally glimpsed on Tony’s Computer. 

Rage was not interested in mushing, but it had been meaning to try out something else, and now, it had the perfect opportunity. 

It waited for a beat. 

“Fuck off,” it enunciated carefully. 

A sharp flare of itself emanated from the propositioning meatsack before it stormed out. 

Rage watched it go, bared its teeth, and belched contentedly.

It had discovered something important and unexpected. 

It rather liked Language.


End file.
